Published/Posted By: The Providence American Posted: September 14, 2013

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AmeriCorps Team Completes Service at Providence Children's Museum

PROVIDENCE, RI Providence Childrens Museums 17th AmeriCorps team recently completed the 2012-13 service year, serving 22,500 hours to extend the Museums reach to children most in need of enriching, engaging play and learning experiences. Providence Childrens Museum has been an AmeriCorps national service site since 1997, committed to training a team of educators to bring engaging play-based activities to children whose exposure to rich learning experiences is limited. The Museums AmeriCorps program has served over 20,000 children through innovative outreach to inner-city community centers and Head Start programs over 16 years. The 16 AmeriCorps members on the 2012-13 team extended the Museums reach to kids and families in underserved communities throughout and around Providence and had a tremendous impact. The team helped children discover the joy of learning as they: Led imaginative hands-on activities about the value of diversity to help improve school readiness for 1,000 Head Start preschoolers in 58 classrooms in Providence, Pawtucket and Central Falls, and welcomed them on fun-filled Museum explorations.

Facilitated after-school and summer Learning Clubs engaging STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) enrichment activities for over 550 low-income children from 20 community sites in Providence, Pawtucket and Central Falls. Participants benefited from creative hands-on activities that foster science process and problem solving skills and explored the Museums interactive exhibits. Summer programs supported school readiness for rising kindergartners and combatted summer learning loss for elementary school-age kids an average of two months of grade-level equivalency in math skills and three months in reading skills.

Welcomed over 1,300 low-income children and their family members to free Museum family nights, where they received complimentary year-long admission passes.

The Museums AmeriCorps team is a group of dynamic and diverse individuals who, under the guidance of Museum education staff, work to instill a lifetime love of learning in children. Dedicated to a year of outreach service at the Museum, AmeriCorps members receive training in hands-on learning as well as living allowances and educational grants in return for their participation in this national service program.